Faith Matters: The holy is found in the midst of very human stories

By the Rev. Maria LaSala

Published 11:03 am, Friday, May 6, 2016

I’ve become a regular listener to the Moth Radio program, an NPR show that has been running since 2009. It’s become quite popular, drawing more and more storytellers and listeners each week. Moth Radio takes place in different settings across the USA, and its directors and producers are quick to remind listeners that “Moth stories are true, as remembered by the storyteller.” They are always told to a live audience. The storytellers are not famous. They are like you or me, narrating life experiences with a story they hope others will connect with.

Last Saturday, as I was in the car, I tuned into the show, live from Portland, Maine. I listened to three stories. The first story was told by a high school guidance counselor who, years before Columbine and Newtown, had been faced with a gunman at his high school. In his story he spoke of how he tried to keep his students safe, despite his uncertainty and fear. The second was told by a woman who learned to stop blaming herself many years after a childhood accident had killed her baby sister. Now an adult, she had finally admitted to her parents that her sister’s death was her fault, only to learn from both her mother and her father that each family member blamed themselves for the tragedy. The third story invited us into the world of outer space, as we listened to an astronaut telling his story of preparing for a space flight, following the Challenger explosion tragedy.

I was riveted as I listened to each storyteller. Each story was compelling. What a relief to hear that all the students survived, including the student with the gun. How beautiful to recognize that in truth telling, a horrible burden was lifted from a sister, a mother and a father. All three stories, made me, by turn, sad, reflective, and full of gratitude. I was drawn in, finding myself first in the schoolyard, then by the lake, and finally in the rocket heading toward space.

What is it about these stories that was so compelling? Is it that they were brutally honest, pointing to moments of vulnerability in lives that are often hard and occasionally wonder-filled? Is it that listeners are offered the chance to connect with another person’s most intimate feelings? Folks I talk with who love the Moth Radio Program have told me just that, and then they have spoken of how each story moves their hearts to be more compassionate, more reflective, more kind and generous ... some, even more loving.

People of faith know something about the power of story, story that moves us and changes lives, story that invites those who really listen to be more compassionate, more kind, more generous, and sometimes even more loving. The story of God’s work in human history, which I read in the pages of the Bible, both the Hebrew Bible and the Christian New Testament, are stories that make a listener’s heart turn toward goodness.

In my years of ministry, I’ve heard many stories of how faith has changed lives, stories from children who have told me how God listens to their prayers when they are lonely and afraid, from couples struggling with broken relationships telling me stories about their trust in the God who makes all things new. I listened closely as a dying man, faithful his whole life long, told the story of how again and again his fear had been turned to gladness, and that even now he was sure that in life and in death we belong to God. Stories of joy, stories of sadness, of compassion and kindness and generosity.

We would all do well to listen to more stories, stories from sacred texts, stories from those around us, even stories broadcast on the radio. The holy is found in the midst of very human stories, after all. I’m doing my best to pay attention.